Vandals Remain in Third Place After Pair of Wins

As the girls did, the Eureka boys held onto the No. 3 spot in the 1A North east league picking up a couple of road wins last weekend.

Chase Green scored 22 points both games as the Vandals first beat Carlin 65-43, then topped Owyhee 53-44.

Against Carlin, Green had 22 points to lead three other teammates in double figures. Mikey Lacovara followed with 13, Tristan Bircham with 12 and Gage Hayward contributed 10.

Leading scorer for the Railroaders was Makai Haub with 24. “He scored most of his points near the end of the game,” said Eureka coach Fred Minoletti. “He really wasn’t a factor until quite late.”

At Owyhee, Green again accounted for 22 points, followed by Hayward with 17.

Dasmond Hanchor and Chance Cota both had 10 points for Owyhee.

Minoletti said, “It was important for us to win those two, keeps us in the hunt. Our defense was pretty good in these games. Offensively, we shot pretty well, at Carlin anyway, and were able to attack the basket pretty well.”

The next night though, he noted, it was an altogether different story in the close win over Owyhee,

Minoletti said. “We just could not hit any shots. We were getting good looks, getting to the basket, too, just not making the shot. I think our shooting percentage was down around 20 percent. Just one of those games where we couldn’t extend the lead very much. But defensively we played well.”

What did keep Eureka in the game, he thought, was their 10-point edge at the foul line. Eureka was 16-of-30 (53 percent), Owyhee was just 6-of-9.

“Our freshman newcomer Brandon Lee, up from the JV team, played really well for us. Played good defense and took a lot of rebounds also.”

The Vandals (13-8, 5-2) will close out the regular season in the next two weeks. They host last place Wells (1-20, 0-6) today, then face league leader Jackpot (15-2, 6-0) and their 12-game win streak, on Saturday. The Vandals conclude league play at second place McDermitt (8-13, 5-2) Feb. 9.

Minoletti said that C.W. Landry, who’s been out of the lineup with a severely sprained ankle for about a month is recovering slowly and hopes to have him back in time for the playoffs Feb. 15-17 in Reno.

Leading the 1A North west league at the moment are defending state champion Mineral County (17-5, 11-1) with Sierra Lutheran (16-5, 10-2) and Whittell (19-3, 10-2) tied for second.